The Honorable Lee A. Christofferson, Presiding Judge
Kimberly D. Nelsen, Administrative Assistant
District Court Judges: Lee A. Christofferson, Presiding Judge; Donovan Foughty, M. Richard Geiger, Lester S. Ketterling, John C. McClintock Jr., and Laurie A. Fontaine
Judicial Referee: Dale Thompson
Number of Counties: 11
Chambered Locations: Bottineau, Devils Lake, Grafton, Langdon/Cavalier, and Rugby.
District Court
Case filings are shown in the chart on the right. The judicial referee continues to conduct juvenile and child support hearings in all eleven counties.
Administratively, the district court continues working towards implementing more uniform practices throughout the district. In addition to the chambered counties, UCIS (unified court information system) was added to two additional counties (McHenry and Rolette) this past year resulting in more current case information. UCIS continues to serve as a tool to all Northeast Judicial District personnel for managing cases.
Juvenile Court
The juvenile court for the Northeast Judicial District operates out of three primary sites: Bottineau, Devils Lake, and Grafton.
Juvenile court officers are now quite familiar with the balanced and restorative justice model and with implementing its components regularly. Several juvenile offenders and crime victims are being referred to the juvenile accountability conference program. Initial reports indicate victim willingness to participate in the accountability conference and satisfaction with the process. Other programs, such as "Keys to Innervisions", intensive tracking, alcohol and tobacco classes, electronic monitoring, etc., continue to be utilized throughout the district.
Restitution and community service is already a major part of juvenile court accountability with a total of $58,060.52 in restitution collected and 11,937.5 hours of community service completed in 1999.
NORTHEAST JUDICIAL DISTRICT CASELOAD FOR CALENDAR YEARS 1998 AND 1999
| Case Filings/ Dispositions | 1998 (F) (D) | 1999 (F) (D) | ||
| Civil Small Claims Admin Traffic Criminal Juvenile | 2,892 1,007 7,843 4,122 428 | 3,067 947 7,843 4,934 428 | 2,768 924 12,656 5,001 354 | 3,206 1,041 12,441 5,309 354 |